Free Explore disappointment

[Geeky Meerkat]

So one of the things that disappointed me about the game had nothing to do with the plot. I found the plot interesting and something I can make theories about. No what I found disappointing was our lack of ability to do some free exploring.

To explain, when you start out the game you are quickly given the task to go stop some people from doing fireworks, and then the next day go figure out what's up with the communications. Both these seem like important tasks and while yes you can go where you want and take your time getting there, realistically these are both time sensitive issues.

Then the game does it's time jumps where many days go by where we as a player don't get to do anything beyond a quick cut scene.

The two days that were the most disappointing where the supply drop day, and the fishing day though. Both these days don't start you in your tower and instead start you already partway to your destination. The fishing one does have other things happen that day though so that is understandable that they wouldn't want you really fafing around on that day as realistically if time moved based off of time instead of events it wouldn't make sense all the exploring you could do before actually triggering the event...

But the supply drop day, it could have been something as simple as Henry saying something like 'I need to get out to stretch my legs and do a bit of hiking.' and then his boss lady saying 'Oh that reminds me, a supply drop should be arriving today, so while you are out exploring you might want to pick that up.'

You could then pick whatever path you wanted to take to eventually get to the supply drop, and explore to your hearts content without feeling like the game was trying to push you in that direction to hard.

Another aspect of the exploring I didn't like was the number of events where you are out doing stuff in the wild and suddenly the game is 'Day done back at tower now'... that wasn't any fun for me. I just found that distroyed campsite and now night's coming. Time to head back to the tower MYSELF. It would have been great to see more evening/early night visuals of the various places.

I was sort of hoping that after beating the game that a free explore mode would unlock, but nope it seems the only way I can free explore is to play the game again and specifically ignore whatever task I am suppose to be working on.

[Kevin Ryan]

Wait i'm confused as to what your issue is.

There's plenty of times all throughout the game where you can explore to your heart's content. I saw most of the map on day two BEFORE it started jumping days.

[Geeky Meerkat]

Yes you can explore plenty on Day 2, and you can be all like 'I think I'm going to go over this way just to see what is over this way' you have the ever pressing thing on you of 'Go check out the communication line' so there is a sense of urgency so of course you go off to deal with that.

But then 70 some days pass where there really is no 'Do what you want now without any sense of urgency to get it done right away'

Seriously the way you explore something changes depending on how much urgency you feel to move forward. I can always go back into the game and start up a game and explore while ignoring plot things until I'm ready to move forward, but I as I say found the sense of urgency at all times in the game to get in the way of actually just relaxing.

Nearly all the 'Your character is just relaxing' scenes are really short too. For instance the scene where you are eating some food watching the sunset. That could have been a do what you want day.

As I say what I feel would have been the best move to provide one day of exploring with out the sense of urgency on your shoulders would be to ALWAYS start you in the tower, and on the day where you need to get your supplies having your boss tell you 'Just make sure you find time to go pick up your supplies today'. Then have the picking up of your supplies trigger evening time, and then let you keep exploring until you returned to the tower.

[hiЯez]

Don't give the impression this game has free roam. It certainly doesn't.

Sure you can choose to go another direction other than the next objective, but nothing will be down there of interest. Nothing will happen.

The paths are very linear and fixed. There is plenty of easy spots you could walk to but can't because of the disappointing invisible walls. Small logs, a few shrubs, a few small rocks... all can block you path because you are not allowed to wander beyond fixed paths.

It's like how a wilderness would be presented in a theme park. There is no variation only the illusion of variation.

[jerrylongbones]

Day 3 is basically "Wanna explore before we jump ahead" since it can be done in 2 minutes if you don't go exploring.

[RainmakerLTU]

Well, I kinda like that we can`t explore everything in one go. I wandered around and checked green supplies box before I was said to do so. So I had to go there again (luckily I knew a way now) and check the box again. Now I think that better I could not go there first time. Dunno, would that be more surprise or what the word...

[GreggRulzOK]

Originally posted by Johnny Dollar:

Dude you can explore pretty much at any time. It gives you an entire day to explore before you call D to tell her you are ready to start working.

Yup. But I totally get what you mean, Geeky Meerkat. Once you've got all the equipment to explore everything, the story definitely feels too urgent to ignore and go on a joy hike. I suppose that's what a second playthrough is for.

[Geeky Meerkat]

Originally posted by BulbaBlunt:

Originally posted by Johnny Dollar:

Dude you can explore pretty much at any time. It gives you an entire day to explore before you call D to tell her you are ready to start working.

Yup. But I totally get what you mean, Geeky Meerkat. Once you've got all the equipment to explore everything, the story definitely feels too urgent to ignore and go on a joy hike. I suppose that's what a second playthrough is for.

Yes this exactly. I'm not asking for a sandbox game or anything like that. I'm just saying it would have been nice to have a chance to explore the area that's all ready in the game fully without urgency.

As an example, the game Gone Home, has a mode you can play where all the doors are already unlocked. So you can just explore the house and enjoy the details put into it without having to worry about the mystery at hand. And I know Firewatch took insperation from Gone Home because one of the books in one of the drop boxes is actually one of the books that the Father from Gone Home wrote.